Computing devices, such as desktop computers, laptop computers, tablet computers, netbook computers, or other such devices, often implement a number of power management techniques in order to reduce the amount of power consumed by those devices, so as to prolong battery life between charges and/or to reduce the total amount of power consumed by a given device. In some approaches, such techniques may be used only when the device is operating on battery power, or, in other approaches, may be used regardless of the power source being used (e.g., battery or AC power). Common power management techniques include performing a screen dimming operation for a display panel of a computing device, turning off the display and/or performing a system suspend or hibernation operation, where current operating state information for a computing device is saved, respectively, to random access memory (RAM) or to disk (e.g., a hard drive, or a solid-state/flash drive), and the computing device is then placed in a very low power operating state.
Such power management techniques may be performed by a computing device when the computing device detects that the computing device has not received any user input (e.g., keyboard or pointing device input) in a specific period of time and power management activities are enabled on the computing device (e.g., an application running on the system (or other component of the system) has not disabled power management activities). For example, a computing device may first dim a computing device's screen after a period of time, and then, sometime later, turn off the screen, and then, sometime even later, perform a system suspend operation or hibernation operation, such as those described above, and remain in the suspend state or hibernation state until the user deliberately interacts with the computing device to indicate the user wishes to use the device by, for example, opening a display panel lid, entering a keystroke, using the pointing device or engaging a power switch. Such approaches, however, can detract from a user's experience. For example, should the display dim while the user is reading the content displayed on the display the user may have to take action (e.g., tap a key) to bring the computer back to full brightness and/or should the computing device transition into a hibernation state, the user must wait for the computing device to resume from hibernation or suspend before the system is ready for use.